


Breaking The Habit

by aislingyngaio



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Gen, hints of rape and underage abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-13
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-04 11:56:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1778167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aislingyngaio/pseuds/aislingyngaio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grant Ward receives a most unexpected visitor and a most disturbing question while incarcerated. Post Season 1.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Issue of Statutory Kidnap

The first time he met her face to face, he would have experienced a frisson of fear mixed with guilty admiration and rampant curiosity, if he wasn't wallowing in his apathy, empty and numb.

Because of course, his sister won't have any idea - or care - that he was alive. And _of course_ the Black Widow would use her name to get past security... and to prove a point.

Instead, he picked up the phone and waited in silence, eyes cast down. He didn't even know why she would be here.

"Grant Ward," she spoke in her sultry voice. ''I believe we can dispense with introductions?"

He didn't react, refusing to play her game, or whatever tricks she had up her sleeve.

"I have to admit to being surprised at your disappointment, Ward," Natasha mused conversationally into the silence. "Considering you haven't even checked up on her, or any of your family, since you were kidnapped."

That brought Wand's head up as he stared at his unwanted visitor with incredulity. "Kidnapped?" he mouthed hoarsely, disbelieving, before wheezing in what would have been hysterical laughter were his larynx not still healing from his last fight. "And here I thought you're supposed to research your marks before interrogation, _Agent_ Romanov." He curled his lip mockingly. ''How disappointing when you've always been held up as an example for the espionage division, when you can't even get your facts straight."

Far from being insulted, Natasha only smiled serenely, though he could somehow detect a trace of bitter melancholy behind it, something he’d previously though the Widow incapable of. "He made you say yes, didn't he?” she asked in a knowing manner. Ward lifted his chin defensively as she continued, “Maybe told you it'd be tough, but you won't ever have to get beaten because mommy had a bad day, or that…” she paused, her gaze almost turning inwards. “...or that your nasty uncle wouldn't ever touch you down there again?"

Ward had to harden his heart to prevent himself from believing what Romanov was trying to say, even as he saw her trying to swallow discreetly by shrugging and saying more loudly, "Maybe he said it'd be fun, and that there will be others like you, that it'd be just like another school?"

He gritted his teeth before trying to dredge up his sneer again. "Nice try, Romanov. But then, you've always been good. I'm honoured, really, that I was worth the effort," he drawled back sarcastically, hoping that his interrogator wouldn't notice the tremor he hadn't quite been able to suppress. And yet, even knowing that it would be taken as a weakness, he found that he couldn’t maintain eye contact with his visitor - _interrogator_. Lowering his eyes again, he kept his gaze resolutely on his clenched fist. He didn't want to keep gazing at the empathy in her eyes.

_She is SHIELD. She is the mission. She is the enemy._

_Remember, you can't get attached to anything or anyone._

Natasha's next words tested his resolve to not give in. His knuckles were almost white as he heard her say softly, "Maybe I'm just curious to find out if it is possible for there to still be a person left behind the mask, Agent Ward.''

Barely able to control his rage and frustration, he slammed the receiver back on its cradle. He looked hatefully at the young woman, who was in reality not much older than himself, and signed in silent anger, _Don't pretend you know me._

Natasha Romanov merely looked back, unconcerned at the badly suppressed violence on the other side of the glass. Slowly, hypnotically, she replaced her own receiver and stood, gathering herself, almost preparing to leave. And without a trace of either smile or irony, she looked straight into his eyes with understanding - who the hell was she to think she could understand him? - and signed back, _Do you? Do you know who you are behind the masks we wear?_

Grant Ward simply turned and walked out of the room, almost glad to be escorted back to his cell again. Yet, even as he forcibly repeated to himself that Romanov was the most accomplished liar SHIELD ever had, that no one, _no one_ , could be trusted, he couldn’t shake off the impact of Romanov’s parting shot, especially when it became fused with the voice of another, from a speech that had haunted him since John's death. It filled in the silence of Natasha's sign language as both memories whispered the same message into his ear:

_Who are you, without him?_

_\- To Be Continued? -_


	2. Stones on Glass Houses

The second time she visited, he barely contained his irritation at her repeat offence. “Don't. EVER. Do that. Again,” he growled in a hoarse voice only slightly better than the last time they spoke. The infuriating woman only smiled wryly. “Expecting her still? When you yourself have never taken the initiative to re-establish contact?”

“That's none of your damned business!” he bit out, staring daggers at his visitor. “What do you even want with me? Don't you have somewhere else to be?”

Natasha adopted a fake serious expression. “Hmm... well, as of last month I've been unemployed, and except for the occasional senate subpoena? Nope, not really.” She paused slightly. “What would _you_ do with all this down time if you aren't in here anyway?”

Ward narrowed his eyes momentarily, before his expression cleared. “Oh, now I get it. Coulson sent you, didn't he?” He could taste his bitterness on his tongue. Did he actually believe for one second that anyone from SHIELD would visit him if not for Hydra information? As if anyone would bother with him unless there was something to be gained. “Save yourself the interrogation from hell, _Agent_ Romanov. Whatever I know, I've already--”

“Coulson.” Her absolutely deadpan, sarcastic look stopped him in his tracks. It sounded so genuine he almost recoiled on behalf of his former (official) Commanding Officer. “You mean my no-good came-back-to-life-and-didn't-tell me-because-Fury-said-so ex-handler. My it's-nothing-personal-it-was-just-the-way-things-are ex-friend. My Agent-Romanov-you-forget-yourself---”

“OK OK I get the picture,” Ward held up his palm in a bid to stop Natasha from describing Coulson for the remainder of her visit, which she looked completely capable of doing. Instead of screeching to a halt, she just raised a brow and told him baldly, “Oh that was nothing compared to what Clint had to say, believe me, especially since he'd known Coulson the longest.”

_Hawkeye._

Swallowing a sudden dread at this implication that the two deadly partners of Strike Team Delta were in close proximity again, he tried to shrug as casually as he could. “So you and Barton are pissed at Coulson, so what? What does this have to do with me? Or are you telling me that your down time is spent solely on annoying people you hate? Me, and now Coulson too.”

She snorted inelegantly at that. “Please, I'm not that much of a masochist. I haven't seen Coulson since we cornered him at the Tower. And hate is such a strong word, Ward. People like us, I doubt the word really exist any more, what with everything we've been through." Natasha gave a wry little smile. "Now, disappointment though? Much closer to what I've been feeling lately.”

Ward rolled his eyes, contriving to look bored. “And me? I'm sure you'll make a special exception to the rule, won't you? Considering... present circumstances.”

She gave him a long measuring look. He wished she would stop doing that. Or maybe the whole point was to unnerve him anyway. “I don't hate you either, Ward.” Curiously, Natasha just left it at that. No elaboration, no explanation, nothing.

He scoffed disbelievingly at her short response, recalling the condemnation he'd seen in the brown eyes of another woman. “Right, because SHIELD agents would never hate Hydra agents, right? We can _totally_ be best friends and skip down the meadow into the sunset together hand in hand,” he said, infusing as much sarcasm into his voice as possible, but not even realizing he'd also been channelling the mannerisms of the person in his thoughts.

_I hope Garrett orders you to walk into traffic._

Natasha pretended not to realize when Ward visibly ground his teeth, his eyes facing her but looking way beyond her, deep in thought. “You forget!” she said loudly into the receiver, jarring his attention back to the present. “That I'm hardly the person to throw stones when I live in a glass house myself.” She raised her brow purposefully.

He laughed.

Laughed and laughed almost hysterically.

He would have continued laughing if his larynx didn't start to protest at the strain. “ _You_. You mean to tell me that you are ex-Hydra? Right. Funny. That's hilarious, Romanov. So why didn't Fury know about Hydra that much sooner? Or are you saying you're so deep undercover that you're still playing the good game?”

Ward could almost swear that his visitor reacted unfavourably at Fury's name, but he didn't think much of it when she replied, “Not Hydra, Ward. SHIELD has more enemies than you can count. It's...”

She suddenly paused to narrow her eyes at him suspiciously. “Didn't your--” He stared at her, daring her to label John a kidnapper again. He wasn't a kidnapper. He _wasn't_! “-- S.O. tell you how I ended up with SHIELD?”

He shrugged, almost conversationally. “Just that you crossed SHIELD in a bad way, and they recruited you instead. That you are SHIELD's finest. That you can do this and you can do that and nobody can do it as well as you.” He almost shrunk at the phantom pain that always accompanied John's comparisons of his and Romanov's skills, especially if he came up short. _It was to make me strong. It was so I could be the best._ “So?”

Natasha let out an ironic little chuckle at that discovery. "Well, that completely explains why you thought I was a viable candidate as Fury's number two way back when. Maria did wonder, when she told me about that little jab of yours." She pursed her lips in consideration, before volunteering, almost daring him in some way, "Why don't you first find out how the position of Commander was vacated in the first place, Ward? Maybe, just maybe, it might clear up some... misinformation. Fill in the blanks, so to speak."

His hackles rising at the implicit challenge, Ward shot back, "And why would I even bother to, assuming I could be in the position to do so?"

"Because a person's history can never truly be wiped away. Everything we are today, it is because of something that happened to us in the past. Both the good, the bad, and everything else in between."

He resented her continued implications of empathy in her words, he truly did. "Platitudes, Agent Romanov? If that's all you've got..."

"Fine then. Do it to compare and contrast what he told you and how much he withheld from you."

 _How dare she?_ "Garrett isn't like that! He told me everything I needed to know--"

"He told you everything _he_ needed _you_ to know, there's a big difference--"

"--and why the hell would I even care about your history? You're the Black Widow, you have the highest marks in espionage. You're one of the select specialist agents working directly under Fury. Who cares where you came from?"

"BECAUSE." Natasha had to take a deep breath, deciding how best to answer the question, while simultaneously giving thanks once more to Clint's endless patience with her in their earlier days. "Not one of us who excels in this field the way we do was ever drafted voluntarily into this life!"

" _I_ did!"

"Then explain to me what happened in the five years you disappeared that made you so hell bent on becoming a spy. Tell me why your enrolment form was submitted by John Garrett even though you are past the age of majority by then. How you were the only cadet to have neither family nor friends, either within or outside SHIELD!"

Ward sat unmoving, not knowing what to answer first, but Natasha continued relentlessly into the silence before he could interrupt.

"Why you occasionally appear for drills already bruised and in pain from far more than "a trip down the stairs", and yet there was never any defensive wounds? Or that those bruises were always earned during certain weekends coinciding with Garrett's leave of absences between missions?"

"He did it to make me stronger," he finally gritted out, against the voice in his head screaming _you're weak, worthless, and I don't even know why I bother with you_. "He _saved_ me, and taught me, and I..."

"...owe him everything?"

Finally, Ward raised his eyes to stare directly at Natasha to utter the only truth he knew, "Yes."

She only shook her head. "Hasn't it occurred to you that it was only because he took everything from you that he was the one who gave you everything you have?"

Stunned and confused, he stuttered out, "He didn't... I was... I had..."

_Nothing._

"He made sure of that, Ward. He made sure you couldn't escape. With me, it had been chains and iron balls. With you..." the gentleness of her voice was so seductive, so... "he told you he could make you stronger. That if you left, you'd be proving yourself weak. Isn't that right?"

He said nothing.

"The fear is the same. The fear of being supplanted, of being discarded, deemed worthless. Do you know how Black Widow succession happens?"

His knuckles on the phone receiver were white and bloodless.

"You are given the _honour_ to seek and kill the previous Black Widow."

_Thump._

"Speak a word of English in a Russian accent, and you die."

_Thump._

"Half a second slow on the obstacle course, and you die."

_Thump._

"As I grew up, I hated the new girls who ended up in the same situation I'd been in. They were just like me, starved, beaten, tortured and trained, but I hated them. I hated them so much, because I fear for the day one of them will be given the honour of replacing me, of becoming the new Black Widow."

_Damien. Eitrienne._

_Antoine Triplett._

"Do you still think it doesn't matter _how_ I became the Black Widow? Then let me ask you... how did _you_ become Garrett's agent?"

Grant Ward stared at his visitor, shock frozen on his face. Natasha leaned forward.

"What happened in those five years?"

_\- To Be Continued? -_


End file.
